The Twelfth Victim The Innocence of Caril Fugate in the Starkweather Murder Rampage

The Caril Fugate story is to be released as a four-part SHOWTIME docuseries on February 17. The documentary is based on the Addicus Books title, The Twelfth Victim—The Innocence of Caril Fugate in the Charles Starkweather Murder Rampage. The series will premiere on Friday, February 17 at 8 p.m. ET/PT, with new episodes airing weekly on Fridays at 7 p.m. CST, 8 p.m. EST on SHOWTIME. All four episodes will also be released on demand and on streaming platforms for SHOWTIME subscribers on February 17. In 1958, nineteen-year-old Charles Starkweather gained notoriety as one of the nation’s first spree killers. He murdered eleven people in Nebraska and one in Wyoming. After a week on the run, he was arrested, later convicted, and sentenced to die in the electric chair. Starkweather’s girlfriend, Caril Fugate, fourteen, was with him throughout the murder spree. Was she his hostage or a participant? This question still stirs debate more than sixty years later. Fugate claims she was too terrified to attempt escape—Starkweather had told her he would have her family killed if she disobeyed him. Unbeknownst to her, he had already murdered them. A jury found Fugate guilty of first-degree murder. She was sentenced to life in prison; however, in 1976 she was paroled at age thirty-two. Now, in The Twelfth Victim, attorneys Linda M. Battisti and John S. Berry, Sr. pull together years of research to tell how Fugate was a victim of both Charles Starkweather and the Nebraska justice system.

John Stevens Berry, Sr. has appeared in court in twenty-four states, and two foreign countries. Following his military service, he was, in 1970 and 1971, briefly associated with the Henry B. Rothblatt Offices in New York, where he tried a number of high-profile cases. He returned to Lincoln, Nebraska, in 1971, and has continued to have a regional criminal trial practice. In 1986, he was Civilian Defense Counsel in the biggest drug bust in the history of Japan. He has conducted seminars for practicing lawyers in Kansas City, Missouri, and Lincoln and Omaha, Nebraska, and has been invited to the Judge Advocate Generals School at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia, to lecture on issues regarding criminal defense in the military. Mr. Berry has an AV rating through Martindale Hubbell and is also recognized by Super Lawyers for his high-degree of peer recognition and professional achievement. Linda M. Battisti is a trial lawyer for the Office of the United States Trustee, United States Department of Justice in Cleveland, Ohio. She is a graduate with a bachelor of arts degree from Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida and received her law degree from Cleveland State University Law School. She lives in Cleveland.